Wednesday, 9 April 2008

Yes its nameless, pointless rant time again. This is a little venting against those who write stuff on the interweb like "e-petitions" (example in a second), which doesn't do a blind bit of good.

In these cases my instinctive reaction is to reply to their messages with a quick outlining of the futility of their actions, but this will lead to the inevitable backlash of poorly thought through, emotionally based responses.

So instead, I'm writing this mainly to myself, and also the few who still read this stuff, because I know you lot are sensible to be able to read something and understand it as "one point of view".

So to the point of my fury then. There is a facebook group (yes I look at facebook), that is a "petition" against an artist in foreign-land #12 who has put a performance art piece of a starved dog on display. This is obviously a piece of rather unnecessary and cruel work. The thing that aggravated me most though is that this piece is obviously designed to get him attention by shouting "look at me!" in the loudest way possible, short of suspending yourself in a glass box on a bridge (maybe he was ignored when young?). So the obvious thing to do would either to write to the local government asking whether this is all legal, or contacting the nearest hippie, manatee hugging group and inform them.

Instead no. Lets form a facebook group to "boycott said artist". BOYCOTT??? What are you going to do, not fly to foreign land and buy his stuff? I know, fly all the way out there, and then turn your back on the dog. Yes! That will do it won't it!? I'm sure that the underground abstract humiliation and torturing artist group survive on the generous donations of internet empowered hippies.

And on the message board reads a rubbish heap of people all bleating the same messages. "oh how terrible". "He shouldn't do that". Yes thank you for your insightful responses to something that doesn't affect you and that you can't affect. It seems to be some modern way of washing your hands of a problem.

"did you see that terrible piece of art?""Yes, but its ok, I voiced my opinions rather loudly on a public chat room""does the government read chat room?""um...well no""what about the artist""well no""what about the supporters of the artist?""no....""but you feel better now you've done it?"".....yes"

Hmmm...I'm all for making the world a better place. But what I have a real bugbear for is those people who make token gestures (picking up their 1 piece of litter, putting their name on a petition, giving their £3 to Oxfam every month), and then feel like they have the right to hold people who haven't done that as evil.

I'm not evil, I'm just not kidding myself.

The most delicious bit of this whole story is the possible outcome of this whole publicising of it. Most likely, nothing whatsoever will come of all of this misguided whinging. But, there is a chance that an artist lover will get wind of this group, find out about this art, love it, and then commission the artist for a work of their own.

If you really care about this one, buy a one way plane ticket and a piece of 2x4, go to xenoland and put the little pup out of its misery. Then drape its body around your neck, and beat yourself with the 2x4 around your face until the media turns up. If anyone is going to become an eccentric millionaire artist, it should be you.

From Collateral:

Vincent: Max, six billion people on the planet, you're getting bent out of shape cause of one fat guy. Max: Well, who was he? Vincent: What do you care? Have you ever heard of Rwanda? Max: Yes, I know Rwanda. Vincent: Well, tens of thousands killed before sundown. Nobody's killed people that fast since Nagasaki and Hiroshima. Did you bat an eye, Max?Max: What? Vincent: Did you join Amnesty International, Oxfam, Save the Whales, Greenpeace, or something? No. I off one fat Angelino and you throw a hissy fit.Max: Man, I don't know any Rwandans. Vincent: You don't know the guy in the trunk, either.